About this blog

My name is Bill Hirt and I'm a candidate to be a Representative from the 48th district in the Washington State legislature. My candidacy stems from concern the legislature is not properly overseeing the WSDOT and Sound Transit East Link light rail program. I believe East Link will be a disaster for the entire eastside. ST will spend 5-6 billion on a transportation project that will increase, not decrease cross-lake congestion, violates federal environmental laws, devastates a beautiful part of residential Bellevue, creates havoc in Bellevue's central business district, and does absolutely nothing to alleviate congestion on 1-90 and 405. The only winners with East Link are the Associated Builders and Contractors of Western Washington and their labor unions.

This blog is an attempt to get more public awareness of these concerns. Many of the articles are from 3 years of failed efforts to persuade the Bellevue City Council, King County Council, east side legislators, media, and other organizations to stop this debacle. I have no illusions about being elected. My hope is voters from throughout the east side will read of my candidacy and visit this Web site. If they don't find them persuasive I know at least I tried.

Sunday, August 14, 2016

East Link Surprises

The Martha
Lane letter in the Aug 12th Bellevue Reporter, “Concerned about park and ride lot closure” reflects another
example of the total failure of the Bellevue City Council to effectively
address the problems with Sound Transit’s East Link.The following excerpt from the 2/13/15 post on this blog describes the problem with the closure, initially scheduled for March of this
year:

The P&R has nominally 519 spaces but commuters use parking
around the periphery for an additional 200 spaces, all of which are full by
7:30 AM. During the peak commute an ST550 bus stops to pick up riders
every 5 minutes. The P&R also provides access to ST555, ST556 and
ST560. It, along with the East Gate P&R provide the major access to
transit for I-90 corridor commuters; the ST550 route having more riders than
any other ST route.

The 4/19/15
post described how the council supposedly dealt with the closure
issue with the ST/BCC East Link MOU they announced via a 4/17/15 email.Section 23.0 PERMITTING, PROJECT CERTAINTY, AND MITIGATION where paragraph 23.4 "South Bellevue Park-and-Ride Closure" in the MOU included the following:

At least 60
days prior to the closure Sound Transit will identify and implement alternate
parking and transit access for the commuters who utilize the existing park and
ride in consultation with the Transportation Department Director and King
County Metro.

That post opined
that anyone who viewed the Feb 9th 2015 Sound
Transit presentation to the Bellevue City Council for accommodating those who
used the South Bellevue P&R would have concluded they don’t have a clue as
to how to do so. More than two months later they still hadn’t responded to the council’s request for
“clarification”.

I later received an
email from the deputy city manager that Sound Transit was to update their
response in September of 2015.Yet nothing in the council’s agendas for
that period and beyond dealt with the issue. The 10/13/15
post, “The East Link Debacle Begins” presented to the council during their
Oct 12th communication period included the following:

Next March
Sound Transit will close the South Bellevue P&R. You could have made
permit approval contingent on ST providing their long-promised plan for
accommodating the thousands of transit riders who use it daily. Yet they
still haven’t provided one and likely never will. The end result will be
thousands of would-be transit riders finding the remaining P&R’s full well
before they get there leaving them little choice between driving into Seattle
or attempting to find other means to access buses.

I followed that up
telling the council the following at their Nov 23rd meeting:

…that next
March their closure of the South Bellevue P&R will make it impossible for
many commuters to use P&R lots for access to transit.

Even Sound Transit, apparently “recognizing” the devastating effect of the closure on transit commuters, delayed it from March until after the ST3 vote this
fall. However the council still apparently "unaware" of closure concerns reaffirmed
their East Link support by participating in the April 22nd
“groundbreaking” ceremony and responded favorably to the ST3 proposal.

Until the Lane
letter I had no idea Sound Transit had even attempted to satisfy the MOU as
none of the council’s agendas had included the closure issue.The fact the council apparently agreed
that Crossroads and Renton are adequate replacements for closing South Bellevue
indicates they still don’t understand the problem. Thus it's unlikely any letters to either
the council or Sound Transit will make the slightest difference regarding the closure.

The only way to potentially stop the closure is to convince the city council to publicly oppose ST3. Those are the letters that could make a difference. While the closure issue alone is surely adequate reason, there are several more "surprises" awaiting east side commuters and others if ST3 provides the funding East Link needs to proceed. More on those later.

About Me

My last elective position was class president for 25 “class of ’57” seniors in Armstrong, Iowa. I received an MS in engineering at ISU, worked at Boeing for 36 years before retiring in 1998. My wife and I moved into our current home in Bellevue in 1967 where we raised two daughters. Three years of unsuccessful attempts to persuade BCC to block EL are available on “extended session” meeting minutes. Copies of many were sent to all the media outlets, legislators, and others to no avail. I’m hoping this Web site will convince east side residents to query their own legislators.